Turn Windows Features On or Off shows a blank window

**Susan Bradley** · 30-11-2007

I am a Windows Vista user. Recently installed Vista on one of my XP running desktop. Due to some problem I am trying to re-install my Windows Media Player. To do the same I went to Control Panel > clicked Programs and Features but the "Turn Windows Features On or Off” window appears Black to me.

I even tried restarting the system several times but still the window remains blank. I am the only Administrator and logged in with Admin account. Any help would be appreciated.

**Winckle** · 30-11-2007

I haven't faced such problem so far on my vista hence dont have any personal experience with the same but as i wanted to know the fix in case i come across such problem i did a search and found an MS KB article describing Icons are missing from Control Panel, or you cannot start Control Panel, the Welcome Center, or games in Windows Vista. I think you should follow the fix provided in the same. It should help you get rid of the problem.

**Susan Bradley** · 01-12-2007

I appreciate your help Winckle but i dont think its gonna work for me because in my case i am able to click all icons in control panel as well as the Turn features On/Off applet starts. But after that it says "Please wait" for searching the installed options and then I get a blank window when the search finishes. Whereas the situation provided in that MS KB is completely different.

**ERWAN** · 09-03-2008

Hello Susan, even i am facing similar problem. While troubleshooting the same i came through UAC (user account control) is. And while finding more info about UAC this is what found

Installing and uninstalling applications
Installing device drivers
Installing ActiveX controls
Installing Windows Updates
Changing settings for Windows Firewall
Changing UAC settings
Configuring Windows Update
Adding or removing user accounts
Changing a userâ€™s account type
Configuring Parental Controls
Running Task Scheduler
Restoring backed-up system files
Viewing or changing another userâ€™s folders and files

I noticed UAC was ON for my account so I turned it OFF in User Accounts and rebooted. Still no listing in "Turn Windows Features On or Off". I was also able to create a new account and have installed ActiveX controls. So, I
assume this meets several of the above requirements.

**Grateful** · 10-06-2009

I have Vista Home Premium running on an HP laptop and I have the same problem. Could it be virus damage related? I recently dealt with a virus and I think I'm in the clear, but I, too, have a blank window when calling up the Windows Features program. And I do need to access this in order to shut off some annoying startups. Please include me when an answer is found. I appreciate everyone's efforts.

I was having this problem too. It started way back when I tried to install VistaSP1. I had to do a lot of playing around and tweaking just to get it to install. Then when VistaSP2 came out, I had similar rough problems getting it to install. My features dialog was blank, I could not even run a Vista repair installation.

The procedures I went through to get it working:

Uninstall all .NET Framework components (This may not have been necessary, but I'm of course unable to check now.)

SFC /SCANNOW (System File Checker) (This was run automatically a few times recently.) http://www.microsoft.com/resources/d....mspx?mfr=true

CHECKSUR (KB948721) http://support.microsoft.com/kb/947821/

The culprit on my system appeared to be KB905866 which never installed correctly, and was supposedly a junk e-mail filter for microsoft mail.

**edarague** · 28-04-2010

No clear answers on the Internet gives to this problem because surely not have had forums and consult others or imagine the situation, but to me if that happened and I posted the solution.

Symptoms:
1. The dialog box "Windows features" is blank
2. "Sfc / scannow" does not work
3. In the system event appears repeatedly: "The service modules, Windows Installer closed with the following error: Insufficient system resources to complete the requested service." with Event ID: 7023

After seeing my system event log I found that the record size limit was exceeded and this was preventing that could enable and disable Windows features, then what we did was increase the registry size limit as explained in: Understanding and configuring Registry Size Limit (RSL) (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/124594/en-us) ... I put in the maximum (0xffffffff) and presto, it worked again, "Turn Windows features on or off." Even the other user suggested making a scan of system files with the command "sfc / scannow" did not work, but now with this small change IF ...

I remember having this problem before, but had not remembered as he had settled, so I'm posting to find it easily in case I forget again and share it with the agony of many other users.

Now, why is it?: I'm going to speculate at this answer but it seems logical ... in my case always requires installing software engineering and often it creates number of records in your facility by a substantial amount of libraries that contain, probably exceeds that limit registration and the problems begin ... why by default the system does not come with the maximum value of log size, I think probably not to occupy system resources, so if I leave it to the experts.